Word: tears
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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...Tears are constantly secreted by glands which get their water from the blood and lie just above the outer curve of each eyeball. Tears float slowly over the eyeballs and drain into the nose and throat through two holes at the inner corner of each eye. Ordinarily this flow & drainage of tears is imperceptible, and serves simply to keep the eyeballs clean and slippery. But dirt or stinging stuff in the eyes makes those glandular reservoirs suddenly empty in a protective local reflex. The excess causes weeping, sniffling and gulping, for hard crying produces more tears than the tear ducts...
Apologists for tear gas, like President John W. Young of Pittsburgh's Federal Laboratories who introduced the stuff to industrial use,* argue that it causes no harm, only a temporary weeping. Last week the American Medical Journal gave them...
Answering a query from Dr. Robert N. Coats of Weiser, Idaho, who has a patient claiming sinus and ear trouble as the result of exposure to tear gas, the Journal pontificated: "It is reasonable to believe that enough irritation of the eyes or throat may be produced by tear gases to pave the way for secondary bacterial invasion, with ensuing pharyngitis and conjunctivitis on occasion. The possibility of the production of sinusitis and otitis media secondary to irritation by chloroacetophenone [commonest tear gas] is not at all fantastic. Chloroacetophenone is not the practically harmless substance it is commonly reputed...
...William D. McNally, University of Chicago toxicologist and lieutenant-colonel of the Chemical Warfare Reserve Corps, recommends a 0.4% solution of sodium sulphite in a mixture of 75% glycerin and 25% water as an antidote for tear gas in the eyes. For burns made on the skin by the gas, Dr. McNally recommends liberal dousing with alcohol, glycerin, or (best) a solution of sodium sulphite in 50% alcohol...
...Other merchandisers of tear gas: Pacific Arms Corp., San Francisco; Certified Burglar Alarm System, Detective Publishing Co. and Lachyrite Corp., Chicago; Manville Mfg. Co., Pontiac, Mich.; Diebold Safe & Lock Co., Canton, Ohio; Lake Erie Chemical Co., Cleveland; Duncan Chemical Co., Manhattan...